Working too much.

Just arrived home, and was a little shocked at myself as I logged my travel time for today. Since September 1st, I've logged 93.5 hours, which is 58% of the total hours I'm required to work for the ENTIRE month, and it's only September 8th. 41 of those hours were actual work, the other 52.5 were travel. During that time I've had 8 flights, flown 9644 miles, been to 5 different states (Illinois, Washington, Alaska, Virgina, and Texas), and worked with 4 different customers on 3 different technologies (AD, Exchange, and ISA/TMG).

The only day I was actually home for an entire day, was Labor Day.

Really no one to blame but myself, since I control my own schedule for the most part... just didn't realize what I was doing to myself until today. Time to slow down, unfortunately I won't be able to until next month. I'm booked solid through the rest of this month.

Who else has been over doing it?

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Excellent1

Used to do this all the time, now it's only occasionally that I find myself in this situation. I'm a little older than the average member (I would guess), so I've had more time to reflect on this sort of thing. After a close friend of mine died, it really hit home how badly my priorities were set. I mean, there are all kinds of things that we KNOW (meaning we understand them on an intellectual level), but it's common to find individuals such as myself that weren't utilizing that knowledge in everyday application for real life.

As an example, we all know that we can't take it with us. However, how many of us live like that? It's not that things are unimportant. It's not that ambition is bad or money is evil, or any of that. It's simply this: if one has time at the end of their life to look back at what they have done and accomplished, I can't imagine one would wish for more hours worked or regret not having driven a fancier vehicle. I believe one will look back and realize that life is about the relationships we have--with family, with friends, with co-workers. It's about making an impact in the lives of those around you and someone even remembering that you once walked on this earth. I believe, and I mean no disrespect to those with differing beliefs, that faith is the anchor that keeps me from continually forgetting this and losing balance in my life.

I lost a good friend of mine a few years ago and I'll never forget the lesson that was seared into my mind afterwards. He had it all--he had a good degree from a good university, he was well-liked, super intelligent, and he was progressing through the ranks like a shot. He had money and toys and all of the things that comes with that. One day he told me something I'll never forget as we were about to leave--he said, "I'm going home to an empty house and a dog. You're going home to a wife and kids that love you and can't wait to see you." He was killed without ever having a family of his own, without ever having experienced the relationships that I had taken for granted. All of the things he worked for? Gone.

Anyway, I apologize for the philosophical rambling, but this topic reminds me again how important it is to realize that we're not promised tomorrow and that we have to balance our lives in such a way as to not let work (or anything else) become the sole priority. I respect Everyone taking the time to post this thread to help us all remember that. Thanks.

Everyone

Well said. Pretty much why I threw the post up. I have a wife and 3 kids. Every since my first child was born, at all previous jobs I've been the one pushing people to go home on time and reminding them that "work will still be here tomorrow". Rarely ever put in more than 40 hours a week.

I've been so excited about the job I have now and just going at it full speed and then some to make a good first impression that I lost track of that. Mostly because I didn't think about the travel aspect of it. I was only paying attention to how many hours I was scheduled to be doing actual work. Travel counts as work for me, even if I'm just sitting on a plane doing nothing.

I wanted to push it this quarter to maximize my travel bonus (I get a bonus every time I travel to a customer site after the 1st 4 per quarter), so I could pay off a couple bills and make a very nice Christmas for the family. I'm on track for 10 trips that qualify for the bonus this quarter. This week has really been the only one this extreme, but it made me stop and think. I don't think I'll be doing it again. The bonuses are nice, but not worth all the time with my family that is getting sacrificed to get them.

undomiel

We recently started tracked non-billable hours at work and while I already had an impression of working too many hours a week I've found that while I'm generally logging 35-40 billable hours a week I'm consistently putting in nearly 70 hours of total working time. And since I now work 100% from home those hours are without travel time. Most everyone else is doing 40 hours with a little bit more here and there. It is something that vexes my wife greatly and incites her to rant at length from time to time. I haven't figured out how to bring the time under control as there is no one else to pick up the slack. It does result in some great bonuses though and probably accounts for the very large pay increases working here without changing employers.

A counter to the not working so much and spending more time in relationships is that financial stress can really poison your family relationship. I've experienced it while being unemployed and barely making ends meet. I've also seen it in friends and family. The huge arguments that break out over finances are not pretty. I'm pretty worried about another relation that repeatedly makes unintelligent financial decisions. I don't think that family will hold together unless something changes. That's why it is a good idea to dig yourself out of debt as fast as you can. Then it is much easier to find a comfortable cost of living that you and your family can happily live with, without having to work yourself to death.

Mrock4

My new position is 100% working from home with a fair amount of travel, so I don't yet know the pain others speak of here, but I soon will.

The pay is great, though, and bonuses are plentiful for those that take the initiative, so I think it'll work out.

onesaint

I'm 4 weeks into my new position. The role includes 1 week of on call time a month (30 min SLA), international travel for up to two weeks at a time, and a global network that requires some decent attention. It's thoroughly enjoyable and I love what I'm doing, but I'm finding the propensity for staying late, moving my personal schedule around, and being all to happy to take on more responsibility is way to easy to come by. My wife and 2 kids are on board, but I get home feeling I need to make up for the attention I'm putting more and more of into work.

My old position was one where I had odd hours, but work was left at work (roughly 40+ hours a week). This new situation where work follows me where ever I go is proving to be an interesting change. I realize with more money comes more responsibility and the position holds all the technology I want to have a hand in (storage, VM, Linux, & Networking), it just has interesting trade offs. One of those being the amount of time and involvement required. The work / life balance is always tough for IT. In the end, I think this is just that adjustement time it takes to get comfortable with a new role and it will pass.

NetworkVeteran

Everyone wrote: »

Well said. Pretty much why I threw the post up. I have a wife and 3 kids. Every since my first child was born, at all previous jobs I've been the one pushing people to go home on time and reminding them that "work will still be here tomorrow". Rarely ever put in more than 40 hours a week.

I'm in a similar boat. I rarely work more than 40 hours, but I'm still finding my stride in a very challenging role, and this past week I goofed and put in 8 hours beyond the 8am to 6pm window! I'd call it a 58-hour workweek (with, travel and breaks included in that). The bottom line, is it's more than usual, and more than I care for. Like you, I have priorities in my life that go beyond work such as family, health, and personal advancement. I strive to be the high-precision scalpal with max impact in min hours. I managed full-time pay for 20hrs/week in a past role.

I suspect I may need to put in 9hr days, with a 1hr lunch/exercise break, for a spell.

yuddhidhtir

@Excellent1: Great advice

That is why sometimes i have to remind myself what my priorities are, there is difference between being happy and being successful, you have to keep a balance,work really hard but reserve time for yourself and family on a daily basis.

Vik210

Nigel Marsh: How to make work-life balance work | Video on TED.com

Has anybody seen this? I really liked it!

MiikeB

I am all about working hard now and making as much as possible so that I can slow down and enjoy life more later.

Also, it is a balance of I don't want work to own my life BUT I want to be important enough that people look to me when things need to get done/fixed.

paul78

Work-life balance is tricky. I am currently mulling over the fact that I am missing my daughter's soccer game as I sit at the airport to head off to a full week of business meetings. While I do work long hours luckily I do not have to travel often and I take family time whenever I can.

Thank you for starting this post to remind us all.

drkat

Quoting Ferris Bueller - "Life moves pretty fast. If you dont stop and take a look around once in a while, you could miss it"

powerfool

Yeah, I was sitting in bed last night on the laptop while the wife was studying. I realized that I have accumulated 208 hours of PTO (the max I can accrue) and we were talking about Christmas break. I suggested that I would take a week off and my wife asked why only a week... it just seemed prudent to me. I rarely use PTO as we have flex time and I put in so many hours that I never have to touch PTO if I take a day off. So, I looked at taking off two weeks and realized that I would only eat into my PTO balance by three days because I would be using 2 regular holidays, 1 floating holiday, and the two days that I accrue in December and the two days that I accrue in January that I either use or lose. Then, I decided that I would take every Friday in December and do PTO or work remotely, and I will do that for three days of each of the weeks I take off, as well.

This really got me into looking at the rest of my year, since I won't be eating into my time too much. I forgot that my kids have switched to a balanced calendar at school, so instead of a four-day weekend in the Fall, they have two weeks off, and instead of a week off for Spring Break, it is two weeks off, again. I am going to see about doing this more often. The only issue with Fall Break and Spring Break is that I have no work holidays in those time frames to keep me from using as much PTO.

November is going to be another odd month for me, as well, since I will be taking election day off to work the polls, then I have travel the next week for work, and then there is Thanksgiving, where I will be taking three days off, total.

I can either keep killing myself, or I can try to strategically work in some downtime.

powerfool

I haven't really been considering the time I put in for school as part of work, but it really is... especially since the program is a special work-sponsored one. I wouldn't likely have considered this program if it weren't for my employer. Even though it will benefit me beyond this job, it isn't going to have the impact that a Top 25 MBA program would have, which is what I would have been pursuing, otherwise (I would likely just be starting it this semester, though). Now, I will be taking a couple of years off of school before I go that route. I think between work and school, I am easily 85+ hours a week. Crazy. No wonder I haven't been able to focus on certifications recently.

Everyone

I was just looking again... I only have to log 57 more hours to reach 100% labor logging for the month. I'm putting in 8 hours today, and 8 on Wednesday, so that brings it down to 41 hours needed. I have 40 hours scheduled for next week not including travel.... so yeah, going to go way over 100% this month. Oh well guess I get to take a couple "Free" days off (i.e. don't have to use PTO) on couple of days I currently have nothing scheduled for.

Really looking hard how to balance this out better after this month. Going to get my boss's thoughts on it this week.